


Teen Wolf, Season 1, Episode 8, Lunatic

by TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Analysis, Episode Review, Episode: s01e08 Lunatic, Meta, Nonfiction, Season/Series 01, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-21
Updated: 2018-09-21
Packaged: 2019-07-15 04:27:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16055540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer/pseuds/TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer
Summary: Warning: Contains spoilers for both the episode and the rest of the series. Complete.





	Teen Wolf, Season 1, Episode 8, Lunatic

Open to Stiles and Scott walking through puddles at night with a nearly full moon in the sky. Stiles has decided they’ll get drunk to deal with Scott and Allison’s break-up.

It turns out, only he’ll be getting drunk. The alcohol doesn’t cause intoxication in Scott.

Some of Stiles’s lines here make me pretty sure Stiles’s crush on Lydia is the only thing stopping him from ending up going on about his confusion over his bisexuality.

This is interrupted by two men who steal the bottle and otherwise act threateningly obnoxious.

Posey’s talent at subtle menace shines here. Scott’s angry at these men, and speaking in a low voice, he produces yellow eyes and claws. When the bottle’s returned, he throws it against a tree.

He and Stiles leave, and Stiles has sobered up enough to be worried.

I’m more worried about the fact Roscoe is there. Stiles didn’t know Scott couldn’t get drunk. If the plan was for them to sleep in Roscoe until morning, good thinking, Stiles. If the plan was for one of them to drive Roscoe, however, no. Bad.

Meanwhile, the two men fall victim to alpha Peter.

Couldn’t have happened to two nicer gentlemen.

At Scott’s house, the radio exposits school has been closed for several days and police are still looking for Derek Hale. Melissa comes in, and she tries to be supportive about the breakup. He insists he’s going to get Allison back.

Over at school, police are patrolling, and Chris and Kate have taken Allison to school. He doesn’t even want to let her out of the car, and Kate is a good aunt. She doesn’t directly undermine Chris’s parenting, but she makes it clear Allison has a sort of ally in her.

Once Allison leaves, Chris irritability makes it clear he knows he messed up and should have listened to Kate sooner. Kate claims alls she was going to say was he needed to get gas, and indeed, Chris’s tank is nearing empty.

Inside, Allison and Lydia are talking. Allison finds it weird everyone’s talking about what happened but doesn’t know they were involved, and Lydia’s response is, “Thank you for the protection of minors.”

Allison wonders if she made the wrong decision in breaking up with Scott. Lydia makes it clear, no, she’s not.

Go, Lydia. And also, couldn’t you stay like this for the rest of seasons 1-2? Do you have to go back to the character I groan at seeing?

Elsewhere in the school, Stiles is waiting for Sheriff S to get out of meeting instead of being in class. He asks if Sheriff S has found Derek, and the answer is no.

I’m curious if Stiles thinks Derek might be alive. Or does he believe the alpha took the body?

He insists his dad be careful, and assuring him he will be, the sheriff points out he’s even brought in state detectives to help.

In class, Scott tries to talk to Allison, but Harris directs him to take a seat. After everyone is sat down, Harris is unprofessional in making it clear he hates being a teacher.

I’m not sure he doesn’t have this job due to certain characters, but seriously: Dude, get another job. No one deserves having to put up with bad teachers/school officials like you, Julia/Jennifer, Morrell, and Monroe.

This out of the way, is he subbing for someone else? The test questions clearly aren’t chemistry questions. Nor is this the chemistry room, but that would make sense if it was still a crime scene.

Scott’s senses start going haywire, and he hallucinates test questions about his personal life.

Yeah, but even before the hallucination, the questions were more likely to be given on an economics test. So, is Harris subbing for Coach?

Scott runs out, and Stiles goes after him. Using his phone, Stiles finds shirtless Scott taking a shower in the locker room.

When Scott has a panic attack, Stiles recognises this, and producing an inhaler, he has Scott use it. It’s revealed Stiles got panic attacks after his mother died, and the reason the inhaler helped is that using it to make Scott think he was having an asthma attack stopped the panic attack.

Scott expresses his heartbreak, and they discuss the fact he needs to be contained during the full moon due to his moon-rage.

Over at the Argents, I think one of the hunters is one of the state detectives, but I’m not sure. Kate is enjoying the weapons, Chris is worried about innocent people, especially his daughter, and Kate has an interesting line about the alpha not going after Allison.

She knows Derek isn’t the alpha. By now, she should, at least, have a pretty good idea what the alpha’s goal might be: Eliminating those responsible for the fire. Does she think the alpha doesn’t know she’s among them? Is she operating under the assumption only those responsible will be targeted for death, and since Allison obviously wasn’t, Allison’s safe?

When she brings up the fact the alpha might have a reason to stay focused instead of giving into moon-rage, Chris asks if she knows something they don’t know.

No, because, he might not know who the alpha is, he might not know who all is being targeted, yet, but he knows who killed the Hale family. He’s always known. He repressed knowing as much as he could, but he’s never been as ignorant as he desperately yearned to be.

One of the hunters brings up Derek, and Kate says Derek is too smart to go out right now, especially with all the police looking for him.

Chris starts to say, “If he is-”

“If he is, you find him, you kill him, you cut him in half,” Victoria declares with a plate of cookies in her hand. “Anybody want a cookie?”

Eaddy Mays is awesome.

Speaking of cookies, Allison is eating one at lunch. Aw. Victoria sent her daughter to school with cookies. Did she make those especially for Allison and have leftovers? Even if she made them for the hunters and sent Allison with the leftovers, this is still a warm-fuzzy thing for me.

Sitting next to her, Jackson wipes some chocolate/crumb off her lip, and then, grossly, he consumes it off his own finger.

If he gets sick, it’s his own fault.

Allison asks, “You want the bite?,” and for some reason he can’t explain, something in him is set off at those words.

Offering a cookie, Allison asks more slowly, “Do you want a bite?”

Aw, Allison’s offering to share the cookies her mom made.

Stop making this so cute, show.

Rubbing his neck, Jackson declines. They talk about how they’re both doing since last episode, and eating lunch in a hallway, Scott hears her talking him. She asks if Jackson thinks she made a mistake, and Jackson answers no, he thinks Scott got exactly what he deserves.

No argument here. If you’re a liar, being dumped due to your significant other not being able to trust you is one of the more mild things a person deserves.

Scott’s response to this is to damage the wall in the middle of a hallway during a school day.

Later, in the locker room, Coach is there.

So, Harris probably wasn’t subbing for him, then.

There’s apparently a pink-eye epidemic, and Coach blames Greenberg. As such, certain players have now made first line on a probationary basis, including Bilinski.

Why has Coach chosen to do this? Did someone else convince him to? If so, why? The most likely suspects are Harris, Julia/Jennifer, and Deaton, but which one is the most likely?

Stiles is ecstatic, Coach orders Bilinski to shut up, and I love how no one even bothers correcting Coach.

When Stiles sits back down, Scott starts, “Stiles-”

“It’s Biles. Call me Biles, or I swear to God, I’ll kill you.” Hah!

Then, it’s announced Scott is to be co-captain with Jackson.

Everyone is dismissed, and Stiles is nicely supportive.

Jackson, Danny, and another player stay behind, and the other player promises Scott won’t be much of a captain when he’s in traction.

Danny probably already knows by now Scott’s a werewolf, and he uses sarcasm to try to steer the two away from any such plans.

Back to Scott and Stiles, Scott mentions practically being able to smell the jealousy in the room, and Stiles sends him to see if there’s any chance at all Lydia might find Stiles attractive.

The series finale left it ambiguous enough everyone could draw their own conclusions. Mine is: No, she doesn’t, and she never will. She does come to deeply love him, but aside from two or three kisses, nothing will ever happen between them.

Scott goes over to Lydia, and they go to a private room to talk. Instead of bringing up Stiles, he asks if Allison still likes him.

Lydia’s disappointed he’s not picking up on her seductive vibes, and she’s cruel in giving him hope, and then, making it clear she means Allison will always like him as a friend.

She comes onto him, and they kiss.

As much as I’d really like to declare this didn’t happen, this isn’t out-of-character for Lydia at this point, and I don’t see what purpose Scott would have for making this up. He genuinely didn’t like Lydia until he started to get to know her in the third season, and even then, it was more a bond formed through shared unique experiences than actual friendship. He’s never been attracted to her, and the only girl he’s shown true entitlement towards is Allison.

This is a regretful moment in his life and not particularly memorable one in hers that neither chooses to dwell on as they get older.

Outside, Scott dully lies about Lydia being into Stiles, and Stiles is further ecstatic.

He knows better, but he’s enjoying the fantasy for right now.

Practise starts, and after Scott’s knocked down, he starts showing off. In the process, he steals Stiles’s chance to get some practise, and he accidentally hurts Danny.

No one on the team appreciates this, and everyone hurriedly rushes to Danny’s aide.

Pulling Scott aside, Stiles makes it clear what he did wasn’t cool

Even Lydia rushes over to show concern, and for half a second, she and Jackson are a normal couple, but then, Jackson notices and brings up her smeared lipstick.

He suspects, but he really doesn’t want to know, and if she feels guilt, she still puts on a flippant, unrepentant front.

In the next scene, Allison is wearing stripes. She’s not possessed, but Kate has started to ensnare and corrupt her. Here Kate’s teaching her how to use a taser, and Kate makes it clear Chris isn’t to know.

Allison shoots her “unimaginatively named bear”. Said bear is named Mr Bear, and Kate is much kinder and accepting of Allison’s excuse of being five at the time of the naming than I would be.

Once Allison does, Kate is all keyed up, and she goes on about, how if Allison had had the taser at school-

Upon noticing Allison’s sudden subdued behaviour, she immediately calms down. “Woah. Now, wait a minute. I thought you wanted to learn how to do this, sweetie.”

Allison tearfully says, “I just don’t know what happened?”

“With Scott?”

Allison nods.

“Listen, my gorgeous, young niece, you’re gonna break hearts left and right, okay? And he was lucky to have gotten the tiny little taste of Allison Argent’s world that he got.”

Allison goes on about how right it felt, and then, he acted so strange it got to where she didn’t know what to believe.

Kate’s all for going on a ‘teenage boys can’t be believed about anything’ fest, and then, Allison mentions Derek Hale. “Wait. Hold up. Scott knows Derek? Alleged killer Derek? Are they friends?”

Allison starts to sense something, and she answers no. “Or at least, that’s what he said.”

Kate wants to know **everything** Scott said about Derek, and she pulls Allison against her. She hopes it’ll give her niece comfort, make her feel safe, and trust her, but if she has to trap her niece instead, she will.

At the McCall house, Stiles lets himself in with a key he made. Melissa isn’t happy or surprised by this. Also, I don’t know for sure if these are the scrubs as she was wearing last time or not. Last time, she had on an open jacket over them, and there’s no jacket this time.

She asks him if her son is truly okay, and both Ponzio and O’Brien do great here. Melissa’s son doesn’t talk to her like he used to, and here she is trying to get some assurance from his delinquent friend.

On Stiles’s end, he can’t talk to his own mom no matter how much he wishes he could, and he understands why Scott has to withdraw from Scott’s, but he feels deeply for her here.

He gives her what assurance he can, and they both awkwardly try to put on good cheer. He’s startled when she mentions the full moon, and she tells him it tends to bring out the crazies to the E.R. In fact, the phenomena is how the term ‘lunatic’ came to be.

Up in Scott’s room, he’s acting rather Derek-like.

Posey really does great with subdued and vaguely off-kilter. It’s neat how he can sell both this and the more bouncy, happy, comedic character Scott often is.

I believe a large part of Scott’s maturity over the show is his narrative bias rather actual maturity, and if anything, in some ways, Scott regresses, but Posey does do great at slowly infusing more maturity of Scott in his performance.

Stiles has brought chains, but Scott insists he’s just going to lock his door and go to bed.

So, Stiles tricks Scott and ends up chaining him to a radiator with handcuffs.

I know Scott’s a new werewolf and was surprised, but pretty fast reflexes for a human there, Stiles.

Then, Stiles reveals he’s found out about Scott and Lydia making out.

Meanwhile, at a store, Allison is admiring a weapon’s scope. She runs into Jackson, and he explains he’s buying a new helmet for Danny.

I don’t understand why Danny is so loved by all the characters, but I’m not complaining. Aside from one scene in season 3, Danny’s one of the things the show did absolutely right in terms of it’s approach to sexuality. He’s not a stereotype or an outcast, he’s an interesting character outside of his sexuality, and the show did something so refreshing by having all the characters act so matter-of-fact towards his sexuality. Everyone knew, literally no one cared, and it was especially nice to see straight male characters interact towards him with no hint of gay panic. And as someone who loves both Corey and Mason separately and as a couple, I’m really glad he paved the way for them.

Jackson offers his ear if she wants to talk, and he reveals he could use someone to talk to, too.

Back at Scott’s, Stiles pours water in a dog bowl for Scott, and I had no idea this was scene was so controversial until I was reading post after post about it.

I won’t be touching said controversy.

Scott and Stiles yell at, argue, and insult one another, and then, Scott lowly lays it out: Lydia kissed him.

Posey does awesome with the subtle, sadistic glee Scott shows in driving this in.

O’Brien is also wonderful. As much as this hurts, as much as Stiles wants to leave, he resignedly sits down in the hallway.

Elsewhere, in a van that doesn’t belong to either of them or Chris, Jackson and Allison are talking. Maybe the van belongs to one of Jackson’s parents.

She admits she doesn’t think Derek was the attempted killer at the school.

Again, all three of the humans not in the know nevertheless saw the not-human thing that Lydia was convinced was a mountain lion chasing them.

Ugh.

“Neither do I,” he says.

Back at Scott’s, he pleads and struggles, and Stiles suffers in the hallway. O’Brien does resolved suffering so well it’s no wonder Stiles went from largely comic relief to such a hauntingly tragic character.

Over to Allison and Jackson, she opens up about the fact she knows Chris is lying to her about things. She has a feeling he knows more about what went on in the school than they do.

Meanwhile, Scott has escaped.

There’s a scene of him running in the woods.

Back in the van, Jackson talks about when he saw alpha Peter standing upright. It could have been Derek, but he couldn’t make out enough features to tell one way or another.

Scott’s arrived in the parking lot, and ugh, Scott- Jackson’s talking about how animalistic the figure acted. Yes, good. I mean, they both saw the creature chasing them, but this acknowledgement is better late than never.

Scott has a hallucination of Allison and Jackson getting hot and heavy, and what is with him and this thought? He has the same fear in Party Guessed.

Allison and Jackson wonder what the thing chasing them actually was, and Scott gets on top of the van.

Cue Derek to the rescue. Tackling Scott, he gets him out of sight before Allison or Jackson can see anything.

In the woods, they fight, or more accurately, Scott tries attacking him, and he effortlessly and repeatedly bests Scott. Heh.

Meanwhile, in Roscoe, Stiles is trying to find Scott, and he comes across a crime scene. Jumping out, he’s panicked at not seeing his dad, and when Sheriff S appears, Stiles hugs him. Aw, and ow.

From a distance, Chris and Kate watch, and Kate tells him about Stiles being a friend of Allison’s. He wants to know what she and Allison talked about earlier, and avoiding this, she suggests the new beta could be a teenager.

I said in Magic Bullet I didn’t think Chris had told Kate about his suspicions towards Scott, and this proves it. Despite his creepy smile here,he was hoping she wouldn’t come into the same suspicions herself.

Chris has always known Kate was responsible for the fire, but I’m not sure if he did know about what she did to Derek or not. Whether he does or doesn’t, he does know being a teenager won’t keep anyone safe from Kate if she targets them.

Over at the McCall house, Derek deposits Scott in Scott’s room, and there’s a great moment of subtle vulnerability in Derek. He cares about Scott, and he wants to be a big brother to him like he once was to Cora, a big sibling like Laura was to him, but after everything, he doesn’t know how. So, he simply starts to leave.

Stopping him, Scott doesn’t apologise for the whole turning him into a fugitive thing. Instead, he goes on about Allison and asks if there’s a cure for being a werewolf.

Derek tells him there’s a belief, but he doesn’t know whether it’s true or not: If the one the alpha bit kills the alpha, they can become human again.

He promises, if Scott helps him find the alpha, he’ll help Scott kill him.

Elsewhere, alpha Peter resumes human form under the moonlight, but his face isn’t shown.

Going over to Jackson, he finds a bloody claw nail in the van, and getting out the torn lacrosse glove he found, he matches the claw nail to the hole.

Just because something fits the shape of a hole doesn’t necessarily mean it caused the hole, but yeah, Jackson’s getting closer to the truth. Way to go, Scott.

Fin.


End file.
